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Noise could mask web searchers' IDs

ADDING noise to search-engine records could help keep surfers’ identities private. A team from Microsoft Research in Mountain View, California, says the technique is a major step towards “provable privacy”.

Records of internet searches made on websites such as Google and AOL are hugely useful to software engineers trying to improve search technology. Such data also give social scientists a valuable window on our largely uninhibited digital search behaviours. The problem is that such information can easily identify individuals who have carried out the searches, breaching their privacy.